The Hand of Grethia: A Space Opera

by Guy Antibes

  “Obsomil. Yes. It was Obsomil and the one Habamil calls the ‘off-worlder’. They were probably the ones who stole the Hand before. The two of them were in the Diltrant lodge together, but I had no idea that there was a portal in that hall that would take them to Actobal!” Ichar’s rage intensified. His eyes glowered as he continued to rant about his enemies. The Murgrontian Lord leaned over and touched Ichar’s sleeve. The eyes retained focus, the torrent of curses stopped. Ichar slumped back in his chair, his energy spent.

  “One tries, one tries to keep the faith… to hold the true principles high and to keep the order that has enabled centuries of stable rule. And this Obsomil comes. We always knew he could create disruption. How couldn’t he, with a father and grandfather so dedicated to heresy and rebellion. And now they have stolen priceless gates and the power cylinders that made them work. Those are the true treasures of our world. Our plans are ruined.” Ichar’s face twisted into an ugly expression.

  Wilton patted the priest on his shoulder. “We only need to adjust and remain patient. Our men are still stationed close to where those drives are manufactured. They should by now have struck that factory. It doesn’t matter if Habamil or Obsomil are in charge. We only need to delay for a bit and we’ll be able to make things right. However, I do think a message to our men to leave Diltrant immediately would be a good idea. I will have one of my men sent there. I always have a ship stationed just off of the coast to take them out with the gate.”

  “Good. One of the two may be dead by now anyway.” Ichar declared. “If Obsomil isn’t, he will be destroyed as a warning sign from Grethia to beware of our dedication and our faith. They will be made to pay.” Ichar was getting wound up again. He rose and paced the room, hitting his head with his fists. His eyes rolled as he continued, “My gates, my holy gates, O Grethia, Grethia, your servant has failed you. They’ve stolen your gifts to us! O Grethia!” Ichar collapsed to the floor sobbing heavily.

  Wilton looked on Ichar with disgust, sniffed and let himself out of the chamber. As he left, he realized that some independent planning might be in order. First, to find out if his army had succeeded in Actobal. He had never yet failed and looked on this setback as something to make his quest to take over the world a bit more interesting.

  ~~~

  Chapter 19

  The ex-lord regent fled past farmlands and the forests that shrouded the mountains. The main road split off into a fork. Taking the left, smaller road, he pushed his horse on until he turned onto a track that could barely be discerned. At last, the Murgrontian cabin came into view. A man with a bow and arrow in his hand stopped the rider. “Lord Regent, why are you here?”

  “Your ‘lord regent’ is now an outlaw.” Habamil spat out bitterly. “Get the rest of the men. We will pull our strength together and make something of our new status.”

  “We attempted to raid the place where your ships’ drives are made this morning. Over one hundred Diltrantian soldiers now guard the plant. I suppose they aren’t under your control any longer. ” the man said. “It appears we won’t be able to gain access. It’s time to give up your dreams to rule. We leave in a few days.”

  “Leave? Leave?” said the breathless Habamil. “I just escaped with my life! We have to take back what is mine.”

  “It was only a short escape.” the man had cocked his bow and sent a shaft through Habamil’s chest.

  ~

  Jan opened his eyes in a beautifully furnished room. He turned and the pain reminded him of his wounds. He rose gingerly from his bed. A note had been left on the table by his bed. “As soon as you awaken, pull the cord by your bed and I will come, King Obsomil.” He rang the bell, feeling stitches pull at his wounds. He gingerly fell back into bed and waited for someone to come.

  “Jan, How are you feeling?” Obsomil said as he rushed into the room. He looked refreshed and well dressed, so it must not have taken much more to re-capture the palace. The king blazed with intensity. He paced the room like a caged panther.

  “My back still hurts.” Jan said. He knew it was a weak reply.

  “My boy, we have much work to do. It won’t wait for you to get better. We need to find those men at arms that you found in the forest. You need to lead us to them.”

  “I agree, Your Majesty. I can be ready as soon as I can get some clothes on.” Jan said more positively than he felt.

  “Good! When you are dressed report to the royal apartments. There will be someone outside this door to lead you.” the king turned and left the room.

  Jan winced as he took off his bedclothes and took his time to dress in the fine Diltrantian clothes that were draped over one of the chairs. A guard was at the door to escort him to Obsomil.

  As he approached the royal apartments, his guide transferred him to the charge of two older men dressed in uniforms he hadn’t seen before. Maybe some inner guard... a royal guard, thought Jan? They led him though a long corridor that stretched over a moat within the confines of the palace. Signs of violence recently repaired with freshly patched plaster showed periodically upon the walls. The three walked and into a courtyard that opened to the sky. They passed a trampled garden, another casualty to Habamil’s usurpation, Jan thought. The door opposite opened and Obsomil rose from an upholstered chair in a comfortably-sized room to greet Jan.

  “You will meet my family first, before you leave.” Obsomil waved to the servants, who left unobtrusively.

  Obsomil placed his hand on Jan’s shoulders and ignored his wince. He looked directly into Jan’s eyes. “As prince and later as king, I have been surrounded by retainers and fighting men. Yet, I have depended solely on you for my life for a longer time than any other man. Before you leave, I want you to know that you only need ask, and I will do whatever I can to fulfill your wishes. I didn’t trust you before and I don’t apologize for that. I make decisions based on the facts that I have at the moment. I didn’t know you until our adventure. Now I would trust you with my life. In fact, I have already done so,” the king smiled. “Now, come meet my family... then you will deal with the Murgrontian camp.”

  The two walked through a pair of ornate doors into a large sitting room. Two women were working on a tapestry. Three boys noisily played a board game of some sort set out on a small table. The children appeared to be between ten and thirteen or fourteen years old. All eyes turned to Jan as he stepped into the room.

  The oldest among the two women rose to greet the two men. “Obsomil, my love, this must be Jan.” She turned and looked directly in Jan’s eyes. “How pleased I am to meet the companion of my husband. Thank you for bringing him back safely from his latest adventure.” She gave Obsomil a rueful glance like one a mother might give her errant son. She offered her hand. Jan took it and kissed it. The others then arose and came to meet the newcomer.

  “This is Domant, our oldest son,” said Obsomil’s wife. The youth looked like his mother, light complexion, brown hair but within his dark eyes, Jan suspected that he saw the beginning of the smoldering intensity that drove his father. He raised his hand in a salute to Jan.

  “This is his brother Donnabrun. He is our scholar at age thirteen.” she continued, “and last but not least, here is Ablemont, our clown.” A cheery ten-year-old, he exuberantly jumped up on Jan and exclaimed, “I heard all about you from Daddy! Are you really from the stars?” The little one for all of his activity was a spitting image of what Obsomil probably looked like as a boy. Jan could only nod through the pain Ablemont had caused.

  “My wife, the Queen Innia”, Obsomil formally introduced his wife. Jan bowed this time. “And our daughter, Princess Merinnia.” Obsomil nodded to the other woman in the room.

  “And a scholar, too, father.” She rose and moved towards Jan. Merinnia had the auburn hair of her mother and the electric blue eyes of her father. Like Domant, a deep intensity shone brightly from within. She wasn’t strikingly beautiful, but as one looked into her fathomless eyes, one appreciated a character of a unique sort, regal poise and intelle
ct. Jan saw those things as he looked at her and instantly became enthralled. Dangerous reaction, he thought. What a family. They matched Obsomil perfectly.

  “I am privileged to meet you all.” was about all that Jan could handle at the moment. Then Ablemont led Jan to show him the game board. Jan was briefly entertained the boy by paying him his undivided attention.

  The king interrupted Jan’s play with a light touch on his shoulder. “Jan, now that you have met my family, I want you to know the importance I place on you and your help. I would be a dead man without it and who knows what would have happened to them. You might have noticed the walls on the way in? My family was confined to palace while I was away. There was some recent fighting when Habamil tried to take these apartments when he heard I had returned. I lost more of my personal guard. Now, let’s go and find those invaders and my brother.”

  Obsomil led Jan out of the drawing room and back to the main part of the palace to discuss where they would find the Murgrontian spies. As Jan left the quarters, he caught the eyes of Merinnia. He felt a hollow forming in the pit of his stomach. He looked forward to returning.

  ~~~

  Chapter 20

  The forest animals chattered. The sun spotted the ground, filtered through the leaves. In the middle of a clearing ten closely bunched men, led by Jan, appeared above the portal. They took a few seconds to adjust and ran for the forest, away from detection by the men in the cabin.

  Sounds of movement erupted to right of the group. Three Murgrontians took flight into the forest. The men clashed through the woods. Jan and his men caught the first man and shoved him to the ground.

  Five Diltrantians carried on after the other two men. Jan and the others went to the sentry. “How many men are in the cabin?” Jan asked silently through his teeth. The pain from his wound still gripped him.

  “Who are you? I don’t know any of you! Why did you run after me? I saw you come from the gate.” the man replied in a distressed tone of voice.

  “We are Alchantians sent to direct your efforts here in Diltrant. Plans have changed. You don’t know us because we are not Murgrontian.” Jan said. “You notice we did not harm you. But to avoid trouble, we need to know how many are in the cabin. I don’t want blood spilled among allies.”

  “There are twenty of us left. Some of us are down meeting with our supply ship. Our orders are to leave tonight. The gate itself is to be taken to our ship and on to Port Alchant.”

  “Good, you can lead us to your hideout, which way?” Jan said, knowing full well the direction.

  The group went to the cabin. Jan’s men held the other guard there. That made four. By Jan’s reckoning, there were 16 more men. He went back to the portal, reset it and disappeared. A few minutes later, Jan led another twenty men to the cabin.

  Habamil’s body was discovered along the way. Flies covered the arrow wound. As Jan looked at the scene, he could see that the ex-regent had all of his weapons on his body, meaning he was killed in cold blood. Jan shook his head and went back to the cabin. “Who is the body on the trail? He looks like he’s a rich one.” he tried to say in an off-handed way to the invader.

  “That is Lord Habamil. He was going to be king here, but King Obsomil showed up and ran him out of the city. He wanted us to help him.” the man grunted and looked at Jan. “What are the new plans? It seems our old ones are about as alive as Habamil.”

  “Take these fellows out and silence them.” Jan said. This was war. Obsomil would be furious at his brother’s death. Fugitive or not, Jan knew that it was never Obsomil’s intent have his brother murdered out of hand. These men in the forest were ruthless killers. It was time to repay them for trespassing on Diltrantian soil. The men resisted, but four were no match for thirty. None made it out the door. “Let’s get out of this place and ambush the rest.” Jan said. This work was distasteful as well as dangerous. Now that he understood the enemy as Obsomil had when he killed to two Murgrontians, Jan didn’t pause to give the command.

  Jan posted half of the men around the cabin and clearing. He went to the portal and deactivated it and led the rest of the men through the woods on a pathway to the sea. The path paralleled the one Jan had followed on both of his trips in this area. As they neared the ocean, he could tell that this path was a few miles south of the village Jan had visited before. The sky was becoming overcast with a high fog. The air was still. The only sounds were the clinking of weapons and the grunts of Jan’s men. Jan called a halt to the column. “Sergeant, I am going to proceed with one other. No weapons, no sound. Is there a volunteer to come with me? Maybe someone from this area?”

  “I will go,” ventured a young soldier. He was of medium height; wiry with long straight black hair, tied at the nape of his neck with the characteristic light blue ribbon of Diltrant’s color.

  “What’s your name?” asked Jan as they took off down the trail. The soldier was about Jan’s age, perhaps a little younger.

  “Pulsgar, sir.”

  “Are you from around here?”

  “From a fishing village a few miles north of here, sir.”

  “A fishing village. Why aren’t you in the Navy then?” said Jan.

  “I hate fish and I don’t like the sea. I never liked the smell of rotting seaweed. I don’t like the fog. Give me the dry land. I can’t say I like going through that contraption we came through any better, though. I don’t like the Navy food. The discipline is worse, the...”

  “That’s enough, Pulsgar.” Jan cut off what threatened to be an endless litany of complaint. “I understand you don’t like a lot of things. What do you like?” Jan asked as the two came closer to the ocean.

  “I like the army. I like horses, although I don’t get to ride ‘em. I like a lot of things, sir. Just not the sea.”

  Jan held up his hand. They were about to step into an open meadow, the path going to the edge of the sea cliff. The fog lowered and the sounds of sea birds could be heard as well as the sounds of the sea. Jan looked around and decided to take a look along the forest edge for some kind of sentry. There were none in the open.

  “The path back in the woods. Does it go from village to village?” Jan quietly asked Pulsgar. The adrenaline from the chase kept Jan from noticing pain in his wound.

  “It goes from the village a few miles north, and the other side goes south ,past my home, all the way to Diltrant. It is a little rough in places but you can go all the way, if you don’t mind wading through a lot of streams crossing the path. I never did like it.”

  “I know, I know” Jan waved him to silence.

  He whispered to Pulsgar. His companion drew a 12-inch knife from his knee-length boot. Jan took his blaster out and both began to thread their way along the path about twenty-five feet from the edge of the forest.

  Pulsgar tapped on Jan’s shoulder and pointed ahead to a large rock. A head could be seen nodding as if the sentry was trying to stay awake. Jan looked and saw another sprawled on the ground with his hat shading his face. Making sure his blaster was set to stun, he slowly advanced on the two. Pulsgar was on a parallel path, staying out of sight, playing the back-up.

  Jan silently walked right in front of both men. “Wake up!” The two startled men began to draw their swords with eyes trying to blink sleep out. They began to continue to draw as Jan realized they didn’t perceive the blaster to be a weapon. He aimed at the closest guard and fired. The man fell senseless to the ground as Jan swung his blaster directly at the other.

  The guard, realizing the intruder did indeed have a powerful weapon dropped his sword with widening eyes. Pulsgar, breathing heavily emerged from the brush, brandishing his knife at the tableau. “Have you got everything under control, sir?” he asked.

  “Yes, Pulsgar.” Jan said dryly. “Get their weapons.” Pulsgar went to work. When he was done, there were two swords, five knives, some kind of steel knuckles for hand fighting and a garrote.

  “You!” said Jan gruffly, “Where are the rest of your men?”

  “Wha
t men? My friend and I were just taking a snooze along the path and you showed up.”

  “What of this Murgrontian weaponry?” asked Jan.

  “Why, uh, my friend and I are, uh, just passing through.”

  “Speak up or we’ll pass you through,” said Pulsgar, showing a meanness Jan had not suspected. Suddenly the 12-inch knife was at the sentry’s throat began drawing a thin line of blood.

  “They are down on the beach up there” the man nodded north from where Jan had come. “I’m just a soldier, I was told to guard this path.”

  “Is there a sentry on the path coming from the north?” Jan asked.

  “Yes.” the sentry said softly as the blade was removed from his throat. Jan pressed the trigger on his blaster and the man crumpled to the ground to join his partner.

  “Pulsgar, go back and tell the sergeant to get his men to the forest where the paths cross. Hurry.” Jan proceeded to tie the comatose men up with their clothes. He threw their weapons deep into the forest halfway on his way to the rendezvous. He got down on his stomach and made his way to the very edge of the cliff, trying to ignore his wounds. As he looked out on the sea, a ship, gray and sleek, lay at anchor a few hundred meters from the beach. A small boat was beached and the Murgrontian men were conferring with a couple of seamen. Jan returned to where the guards lay, and then went to the main path.

  “It’s likely there are sentries along the path to the north. Pulsgar will lead you. Make sure you take care of them without a sound. Four men should be enough. The rest of you follow me.” Jan led them to the smugglers’ beach.

  “We’ll have to make a frontal assault. Twenty men against fifteen. Stay out of my way and we may not have to fight at all.” Jan warned holding up his blaster. The group climbed down the cliff on the other side of the smugglers’ cove. As they rounded the edge of a cliff and came into full sight of their adversaries, alarm spread among their foe. Jan ran as fast as he could towards the water’s edge and better footing on the wetter sand. He opponents were out of the range of his blaster. He didn’t have to worry. They were coming to him.